Page 93 of Zenith Tower

Marrow stood in front of it.

Two stewards flanked him. One held a baton. The other had a whistle looped around his wrist.

Marrow looked at me, then Astra, then the key in Caspian’s hand.

“She used my name on your review order,” he said.

“She knew what she was doing,” Astra replied.

“Turn around. I can still record this as an error in the handover.”

Caspian moved toward the iron plate.

Marrow nodded to the steward with the baton.

The corridor was too narrow for Caspian to clear the swing with the iron door at his back. I stepped inside the arc and took the shaft across my left forearm.

Pain burst through the healing burns. My hand went numb.

I caught the baton with my right hand before the steward could recover and drove my shoulder into his chest. He struck the wall hard enough to lose his grip. Caspian took the weapon and swept the man’s feet from under him.

The second steward lifted the whistle.

Astra caught the cord and pulled him off balance. He turned toward her. She drove the heel of her hand under his jaw, the strike clean and close, then twisted the whistle freewhile Caspian trapped the man’s wrist against the wall with the baton.

Marrow moved for the door.

I caught him by the back of his coat.

He turned into the grip, faster than I expected, and drove his fist into the arm the baton had struck. White pain opened from wrist to shoulder. The Mark beneath my sleeve surged with it.

Copper light broke through the fabric.

Marrow saw.

“You cannot keep holding that down,” he said.

“I don’t need to hold it long.”

He reached inside his coat.

I trapped his wrist before his hand closed around the key. He braced against me, heels set on the wet stone, using the narrow corridor to keep his balance.

“Every step past this door becomes evidence,” he said through his teeth. “Kieran goes back into review. The three of you join him.”

I turned his wrist and forced him to the wall.

Caspian stripped the key from Marrow’s inner pocket. Astra had already taken restraint cord from the fallen steward.

Caspian stripped the other steward’s restraint cord and bound the two men wrist to wrist. We moved all three into the records annex. Marrow fought at the threshold, but the corridor gave him nowhere to shift his weight. I put him down between the file crates, and Astra bound his wrists to the shelving upright.

Marrow tested the cord and looked at her.

“She has exposed herself for this,” he said.

Astra tightened the knot. “She knew the cost.”

He drew a careful breath through his nose and tested the cord again.